Linking Theoretical Perspectives to Analyze Health Information and Communication Technologies in

Over the course of the past thirty years, Brazil has developed health information systems (HIS). However, to date these HIS are fragmented and ongoing endeavors to integrate them have failed. Thus, this research-in-progress links two theoretical streams, namely: (a) HIS in developing countries; and (b) Information and Information Technology in Health, in order to establish a framework to assess health information and communication technologies (ICT) in Brazil. The proposed framework sees health ICT as a public policy aiming at developing technical artifacts – information systems, standards, processes and rules – to assist society in health issues. Besides, this framework sets up analytical dimensions for assessing this public policy, namely democratization, effectiveness, sustainability, and synergy. The proposed framework also enables the analysis of the trajectory of this public policy via the actors involved with it – politicians, bureaucrats, executives, and civil society –, who interact with each other within spaces influenced by rules and material elements such as information systems and previous standards